Falling is like this Highschool AU
by Miss Starry Skies
Summary: The new year has begun at S.H.I.E.L.D.Academy, a school for the brilliant and the rich, and it seems like it's going to be a season for love. Only Loki hasn't the slightest desire to get his hormones twisted. After only recently discovering he has been adopted, he feels like there are more important things for him in life. But then he meets the new exchange student from England...
1. Prologue

**Prologue**

It was a hot Monday morning in late August and the sun was shining mercilessly on the impressive red brick buildings of S.H.I.E.L.D. Academy, Long Island. The wood panelled halls of one of the most exclusive private schools in the world still had to be filled with the sounds of students, for right now everyone was gathering in the school auditorium. The room was stuffed to the last seat. It was almost unbearably hot and the air was stale and smelt of burnish and too many people.

Loki Odinson hated the yearly assembly on the first day of school. The auditorium was stuffed with students, who were eyeing each other over like a pack of harpies. Every new haircut and every pound one might or might not have gained over the summer was judged and every rumour uttered in the past three months got warmed up again in fast forward.

He subconsciously loosened his uniform tie. He should have been used to this by now; being looked at and whispered about behind his back. That was what he got for hanging with "school royalty"; even though Loki felt anything but royalty compared to his jock brother and his group of super popular friends. This year however he knew it was going to be different. There was no hiding behind the cool kids and "oh my God, he's _so_ handsome" Thor Odinson, because _he_ was the juicy news. And he hated it. He could almost hear their whispers.

"_Have you heard? Loki Odinson's adopted."_

"_Man, it must suck to know your whole life's been a lie."_

"_No wonder he's nothing like his brother."_

He closed his eyes and tried to take deep calming breaths against the suffocating feeling of panic he thought he had gotten used to over the summer. But while he might have found an outlet for the restlessness of mind that kept him wide awake at night, he felt much too vulnerable now and had no idea what to do about it. He turned to Thor, who was sitting to his left and was right now busy scanning the crowd of students around them. He was probably looking for Jane Foster. His brother had all the appearances of a loyal puppy, when it came to his pretty physics tutor. It could have been funny, had Loki been in the mood to be humoured.

He was just about to tell Thor that he was going to cut the whole welcome crap and would meet him and the others later after class, when Principal Fury climbed the stairs to the podium. Loki cursed under his breath. So much for a last minute escape.

Fury might have had only one eye, but that one saw literally _everything_ – even a single student sneaking out of a room packed brim full with other students. It was downright terrifying. He leaned back with a sigh and accepted his fate; which in this case meant an hour of the same old verbiage, introductions of teachers he had known since freshman year and a litany of outdated ground rules Loki was sure would still be the same on the day their children's children would enter this school for the first time.

He turned his head to look at his friends. Natasha and Clint were both bent over something – possibly geeky – on Clint's phone, while Steve desperately tried to handle Tony, who was busy feigning loud snoring noises. His girlfriend Pepper was sitting next to him with her arms crossed in front of her chest and her eyes pointedly fixed on Fury. She had given up trying to teach Tony some manners about the same time last year, mostly because she knew that half of his cool behaviour was an act anyway. Loki was pretty sure that Tony had heard every single word that had been said by Fury, who now stepped aside to let their English teacher and guidance counsellor Mr. Coulson have a few words. If he noticed how the sound of hushed whispering had all but doubled since Fury had stepped off the podium, he did a killer job not showing it as he gave his obligatory "My office is always open for you" speech. Loki's stomach did an involuntary flip when he realized that he would have to go see Coulson rather sooner than later. With the whole school talking about his… _situation_, it was just a matter of time before he would be called in for a little guiding and counselling.

"Who's the new girl?" Thor suddenly asked, craning his neck. "She's sitting with Jane."

"New girl? Where?" Tony asked very much awake now. He only grinned, when Pepper slapped him on the arm playfully. Loki too, followed his brother's gaze, but all he could see of the girl sitting two rows in front of them was the back of her head and the blondest ponytail he had ever seen in his life.

"No... Is that…? No way…" Tony muttered to himself as he procured a little paper ball from the pocket of his jacket, which he then quite unceremoniously tossed at the back of the new girl's head.

"Tony!" Pepper screeched, but hurried to hush herself when several people turned around to them. "Have you lost your mind?" she hissed. The new student turned around to them with a clear look of annoyance on her face. It however quickly dissipated into one of the brightest smiles Loki had ever seen the moment she recognized Tony.

She mouthed a silent "Hi!" and then started to mime something that was probably supposed to mean she was going to meet him outside after the assembly.

"You know her?" Pepper asked incredulously. "Why do you know her?"

"Oh, I love it when you're jealous." Tony said and good-naturedly pecked her on the cheek. "That girl there, ladies and gentlemen, is Rose Tyler."

Loki had never heard that name before, but apparently it was important enough to have Natasha look up from Clint's phone. "Rose Tyler?" she asked. "As in Vitex Industries Tyler?"

"The one and only." Tony replied with a grin. "Probably the richest kid in the United Kingdom and one hell of a party animal from the very little I can remember. I've met her when I was in London with my uncle last summer. Stark Enterprises has some big time collaboration with Vitex going on – something to do with making a name on the European market, I think. Her mother seemed very interested in S.H.I.E.L.D. Academy at the time, but I thought she was just trying to be polite. Looks like she thought a little suburban idyll would do her daughter some good. Poor woman has no idea." He gestured for her to wait for them outside. "You'll like her. She's great."

Loki seriously doubted that Pepper was all too fond of the new girl in town, not from the way she was glaring daggers at that impossibly blond mop of hair. He however was positively thrilled. Nothing was more exciting gossip than a new student.

Now he only needed to find a way to dodge Coulson long enough for him to lose interest and this was going to be a peaceful year for him after all.


	2. Chapter 1

_**A/N:**__Thank you so much for all those kind and sweet reviews. I am really happy you like this story so far! It's a lot of fun to write it (and those of you, who know me from Tumblr, know that I myself fangirl over this AU much more than I probably should =D). Thank you Beccy, for being an amazing (and amazingly quick) beta 3 – Love, Sara_

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**Chapter 1**

"Rose Marion Tyler!" Tony announced in the most hilarious fake British accent he could muster.

"You should have called!"

The assembly was – finally! - over and the hall was buzzing with students hurrying to make it to their first class of the year. All Loki could see over the mass of school uniforms, backpacks and generic hairstyles was a flash of impossibly blonde hair as Tony engulfed the infamous Rose Tyler in what could only be described as a bear hug and he even went as far as to give her a little twirl. She must have made quite the impression on him, Loki thought as he approached them along with his no less curious friends, when the joy of seeing her again was enough to have Tony "to cool for school" Stark forget that he normally was… well, _too cool for school_ did describe it quite well.

"Should've never shown you that stupid ID, Anthony _Edward_." Rose declared with a mock scold as he put her back down on her feet. She smoothed her skirt down with a scoff, but the smile tugging at the corner of her lips betrayed her. She was obviously happy to see him. She turned around and took a startled step back when she suddenly found herself face to face with an elegant ginger, who was eyeing her with something dangerously close to a death glare. But she gathered herself rather quickly, Loki found with nothing less than honest admiration.

"You must be Pepper", she said and extended her hand with a smile. "You were all Anthony here talked about when he was in London. Two weeks he kept moping about how he'd rather spent the summer in Rome with you." There was a mischievous glint in her eyes, when she leaned in and added in a not-so-very-hushed voice: "I think I even caught him staring at a picture of you he's been carrying around in his wallet."

"He did…?" Loki could practically see Pepper's reservations against this strange girl melt away like ice in the sunshine, as she took the hand she'd been offered. She looked from Rose to Tony, who was blushing furiously and back to Rose. "Really?"

"Really." She laughed - not some fake, trying-to-make-a-good-impression laugh, but one that was honest, open and from the heart. It seemed to light up her whole face and the whole room as well and out of the blue Loki felt like someone had put his whole world in slow motion.

Rose Tyler took his breath away; quite literally. Of course he had done his quick assessment of her in the auditorium and upon approaching her in the hall – he was a healthy boy of eighteen after all – but he hadn't been prepared for the sudden impact she now had on him. He had thought she was pretty, yes. But nothing more.

She didn't have Pepper's innate grace or Natasha's downright intimidating beauty. She was pretty – _very_ typically British so, with her dyed hair, that was just a tad too yellow to look natural and those thickly mascara-covered lashes. She wasn't his type at all. Not that he knew _what_ his type was exactly, but he had been sure it wouldn't be a girl who looked like she had just hopped off an episode of some BBC sitcom. Yet there he was, stunned into a peculiar kind of trance, where he could do nothing more, but gape at her like an idiot.

Her dark eyes made an intriguing contrast to her light hair and shone with her laughter. Even with the unflattering navy blue school blazer, he just _knew_ that underneath she'd be all soft curves and soft skin and his hands itched with the strange urge to touch her. Her tongue peeked out the tiniest bit between her teeth when she laughed the way she did now and Loki caught himself wondering what it would be like to press his mouth on those full, pink lips and touch his tongue to hers and… _Whoa!_

Talk about being a healthy boy of eighteen. Loki was far too much of a realist to believe in a ridiculous concept like love at first sight, but whatever it was Rose Tyler had done to him, it must have caused some serious brain damage. He desperately tried to breathe away the sudden feeling of dizziness, but the blood kept rushing in his ears and when he stuffed his hands into the pockets of his trousers, they were clammy and hot.

He frantically searched through his brain for the most hideous and unsexy image he could think of and after what felt like years rather than seconds, thankfully settled for the distant memories of a documentary on slaughterhouses a very weird and very vegan teacher had made them watch back in Junior High.

"And this handsome and slightly socially awkward guy is Loki Odinson." Tony's hand on his shoulder put an abrupt end to Loki's stunned rigor. It was only then he noticed how everyone, including Rose, was looking at him expectantly. He felt a red hot blush creep all the way up his back and into his cheeks, when he realized that he had obviously missed his turn of introducing himself, while he had been busy trying to replace the image of Rose's tongue with the memory of dead horses.

"Hi", Loki mumbled against the sudden dryness in his mouth, but his voice sounded thick and hoarse, so he decided he'd rather say nothing at all. The others exchanged subtle glances with each other. Only that they weren't subtle. At all.

Of course his friends would find it strange to see him – the guy who quit the debate team, because it hadn't been enough of a challenge – so tongue tired out of the blue. He could only hope they would excuse it with the overall foul mood he had been in all summer affecting his ability to behave like a decent human being in front of a stranger. He really prayed that this was the case. Even one third of what had just been going through his head would have been lethal in the hands of Tony – or any of his friends, including his brother.

Loki was so busy looking anywhere but at Rose or his friends that he didn't see the knowing smiles Natasha and Clint exchanged with each other behind Rose's back. Neither did he see how Rose's face clouded over at his seeming hostility for the briefest of moments.

"We should be going", he told Natasha, when he found he was steady enough to talk again. "Coulson will make my life a living hell, when we're already late for the first class of the year."

"Wouldn't want to start right where we left off last year", Tony remarked with a grin.

"You have Advanced English with Mr Coulson?" Rose asked and started to go through a couple of papers she had in her hand. From where he was standing Loki could see a floor plan, security advices, a copy of the school regulations and a class schedule. "Me too."

_Of course_, she had to be a junior, Loki thought with something close to desperation as he followed Rose and Natasha down the hall and to their classroom.

He barely noted the way people were craning their necks to get a good look at them. It seemed like half a lifetime ago that he had rejoiced over the fact that Rose was there to divert people's attention from him. That had been before she had gotten _his_ attention.

His life was a mess. He was still angry and sad and confused, with no idea who he really was, now that he wasn't his parent's child anymore. There was no room for something as trivial as a crush on the new girl. Because that's what it was – _if_ it was anything at all. A little crush. Unexpected and overwhelming, but still nothing more than a crush. There was no such thing like love at first sight, if you didn't live in the world of fairytales and happy endings. And if there was only one thing in the world Loki knew with absolute certainty, then it was that he didn't...


	3. Chapter 2

_**A/N:** Thank you so so very much for your sweet reviews and favourites and follows and everything! And special thanks if you have been sticking around until now. I know I am terribly slow, but life is being crazy right now and after having been thrown off everything remotely normal for at least two weeks after meeting Tom Hiddleston (yes, that's right - also this should mark the last place where I had yet to brag about it^^) I now am totally caught up in work, housework and my upcoming trip to Turkey with my mum. But I promise I will try to be quicker with the next chapter (and it will have a bit more plot than this one - SO SORRY!). Thanks to Beccy again, for being a super quick beta!_

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**Chapter 2**

The stifling heat of the day had given way to an equally unbearable night.

Rose had no idea how people were able to cope with this. It might have been a little cliché, but she didn't remember a time when a summer in London had been able to keep her awake like that. She had spent two hours tossing and turning in her bed, before she had finally decided that maybe a little midnight stroll would help tire her out enough to get at least a few hours of sleep.

The house had been quiet. Rose had peeked briefly into Jane's room, hoping her host sister might have been awake as well and up for a little chat. Her first day of school had been quite exciting after all and she wouldn't have minded to talk about it. But Jane had been sound asleep and Mr. Foster had not been home at all.

One thing Rose had already learned over the week she had been staying with the Fosters now, was that if something "enthralling" came up in his laboratory at Stark Enterprises, Jane's father sometimes wouldn't come home for days, completely forgetting he had an underage daughter waiting for him. Lucky for him though, Jane was enough of a science geek herself to understand and even support her father's peculiar habit of going MIA over his work.

Rose sometimes asked herself if Mr. Foster had even noticed that someone else was also living in his house now or if every now and then he just wondered when exactly his daughter had become a blonde with an odd accent, before diving back into some complex physics problem that no mere mortal could even begin to comprehend.

Rose was fairly certain that her father would have been a lot less enthusiastic about his only daughter staying with his old friend from university, had he known that Jane and she were living in a more or less self-sustaining flat share, where the only parenting taking place was Jane making sure that same friend was dressed and fed when he left the house in the morning.

Rose however was happy to have to stand on her own two feet for once in her life after having been pampered for years, first at her exclusive boarding school and then later at home where she had been constantly surrounded by nannies, housekeepers and even cooks. Now she was seventeen and the only thing she knew how to make and that even remotely qualified as cooking was beans on toast – and even those she burnt more often than not.

For once it was nice to see what normal life looked like – well, as normal as it could get with the expensive private school and its "royal family" that was Tony Stark and his friends.

Rose still couldn't quite believe this first day of school had been real and not some High school movie-ish dream. Of course she had known that she would eventually run into Tony, after all he was the reason she had known about S.H.I.E.L.D. Academy in the first place. But she'd never have thought that by lunchtime she would find herself amidst his circle of friends, seated comfortably between Jane and Natasha, like it had never been any other way.

Rose had been stunned by how oblivious Tony and his friends seemed to be of the way people were craning their necks after them and whispering behind their backs. Rose however couldn't blame them. They certainly were quite the sight. In fact, she found that the level of handsomeness in this group was almost ridiculous. First there were Natasha and Pepper, who were both so breathtakingly beautiful that Rose couldn't help but feel like a lump compared to them. Then there was Thor and Steve, both of them tall, athletic and incredibly good-looking, with all the appearances of sports stars with the varsity jackets they were allowed to wear instead of the standard navy blue school blazers. And while Tony did his best to maintain his rather unusual image as the science genius gone cool rebel, Clint seemed to very gladly fill the role of the funny, laidback fella you could go through thick and thin with.

And then there was Loki.

Tall and lanky Loki Odinson, with his gorgeous blue eyes and blonde curls that brought Jane Austen film adaptations to mind and would have sent her mother into never-ending transports of delight. Loki, who wasn't her usual type by several pounds of muscle, but had something about him that struck a chord with her. After all he had been the only one, other than Tony, Rose had really noticed during the assembly and she had spent a great deal of this day thinking about him since – more than she cared to admit, actually. And even though Jane had by now filled her in on the Odinson's family problems, he still didn't quite make sense to her.

She couldn't get the way he had looked at her in the hallway that morning out of her head. It had been a look that said "There you are. Where have you been all my life?" It had been so open and unrestrained that for a second there it had taken her breath away. Her knees still got weak just thinking about it. But then just like that, the moment had been over and Loki had visibly drawn back into himself. For the remainder of the day he had been absent and grumpy. He had ignored her in class and later, when they all had met in the little patio adjoining the cafeteria for their lunch break he had just sat there and silently stared at his food until it had been time to get back to class – where he had then continued his game of ignoring her. By the time she had gotten in the car with Jane in the afternoon, Rose had been almost ready to believe that maybe she had only imagined that moment in the hallway.

Of course she understood that Loki had other things on his mind right now with everything he was going through and she felt truly sorry for him, but that didn't mean that she was able to ignore the way her heart had skipped a tiny beat when she had caught him looking at her like that, or how she hadn't been able to stop thinking about it while she had been lying awake in her bed tonight…

"Get a grip, Tyler!" she muttered to no one but herself and the empty street before her, stuffing her hands in the pockets of her jeans in a gesture of stubbornness.

She would not do that. She would not ruin a perfect first day by overanalyzing the chances of Loki Odinson liking her. Or not liking her. She had moved halfway around the world to finish school far away from the social madness that was the London upper class and maybe make some friends along the way. So far she found that she'd had a pretty good start doing just that and she was not going to let the first cute boy who came her way make her forget about it.

She would go home now, get a good night's sleep and tomorrow she would have another great day at her new school with her new friends. If Loki had come around by then, fine. And if he had not… well, then it was his loss, wasn't it…?


	4. Chapter 3

_**A/N:** Thank you all for being so sweet and patient with me! With this chapter I'd been hit with a really severe case of writer's block, so I am extra glad I got to finish it before leaving for Turkey tomorrow (not trying to put any pressure on you guys, but your reactions on this chapter could have the power to make or break my holiday mood *lol*). Thanks again to Beccy for being the bestest (and good God can you believe it, fastest) beta in the world *huggles*_

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**Chapter 3**

The warm night air was burning in Loki's lungs as he ran and he couldn't hear over the sound of his own heavy breathing. His legs were heavy and he was starting to trip on every other step. When he raised one hand to his nose, he realized that he was bleeding. His whole body was screaming with exhaustion. And he felt utterly, incredibly alive.

Never in his wildest dreams would he have thought that something as blunt as picking fights with drunks and wannabe bad boys could be the solution to the aggravated insomnia that kept pestering him ever since the truth about his parentage had come out. But for him, at least for a little while, it did the trick.

It had all started on one of his many sleepless nights during the summer holidays, when he had been out on the streets in another one of his futile attempts to run off the thoughts that kept him awake. He was a good runner. In fact, he was one of the best long distance track runners his age. He had come in second over the 5k at last year's Nationals and while running wasn't as popular a sport as football or basketball – no big, public events, no jackets and especially no swooning fans - it was still enough for him to be able and dare to dream of a college scholarship. But much more than that, running had always been something Loki had sincerely enjoyed. It had helped him, even in the craziest of times, to keep a level head. In the end though, he'd had to learn the hard way that there were things in life that he couldn't run away from.

He couldn't escape the look of pain on his mother's face when she told him. He couldn't escape the look of utter shock on his brother's face or the way his father had stopped to really look him in the eyes ever since. He couldn't outrun that peculiar feeling of being bereft of his roots – like he was floating with no safe haven left for him to return to.

He could run all night long and still not distance himself from the cruel, haunting questions that kept him wide awake. Who was he? Where did he come from? Who were his real parents? Why hadn't they wanted him? Or had they wanted him? And if they had, why couldn't they keep him? Did they still think of him sometimes? Did they miss him?

And what about the family he grew up in? Did his parents see him differently than they saw their real son? Did they look at Thor and him and mourned the fact that they were nothing alike? Did they sometimes wish that he was more like them? Could he _try_ and be more like them? Was there a way to trick genetics? Could he be more of a "real Odinson" if he just worked hard enough? Could he be like Thor? Happy, popular, _perfect_ Thor.

How did Thor feel about all this? He had gone out of his way to pretend like nothing had changed between them, but how could that possibly be true when for him _everything_ had changed? Should he really believe that his brother did still look at him the same, when he himself felt like he was living with strangers? How was he supposed to believe anything he was told, when he had just found out that for the past eighteen years he had been lied to by those he had trusted most in this world?

And underneath it all, there was the anger. It was like dull pain that kept throbbing under the surface, eating away at him every minute of every day. And sometimes it broke free like a raging beast and with so much force it literally took his breath away.

Loki had run until his body had given in beneath him and still he hadn't been able to escape this all consuming rage - until that one fateful night eight weeks ago.

He had been on one of his rounds when the guy had appeared out of nowhere. He had been drunk. Or high. Looking back now Loki couldn't tell. He still clearly remembered the knife though - small, deadly and shining in the light of a street lamp. It had been money he wanted. Of course.

All his instincts had told Loki to run, to use his natural advantage and just get away, but he didn't. He had stayed – frozen in place by a dangerous mixture of shock, adrenaline and underneath it all this ever raging anger. He had launched himself at the guy without a second thought. Everything had been quite the blur then, a wild, violent rush and in the end the guy had been on the ground, the knife laying several feet away in the dark, forgotten and unused.

Loki hadn't called the police. The last thing he needed was gossip over the night they found the Chief's _adopted_ son standing over a knocked-out mugger. He had gone home in a peculiar kind of haze with his heart beating a rapid, primal rhythm in his chest. And for the first time in weeks he had been asleep before his head had even touched the pillow.

But very much like with any other drug – and Loki was clever enough to know that this really was no different – the relief and the height of this adrenalin rush had not been permanent and before long he had found himself out at night, looking for ways to bring back this feeling of liberation and excitement.

Long Island might have prided itself for its suburban charm and white picket fences, but that didn't mean that it was short of shabby bars and idiots with anger management issues. And if someone was as good at reading people as Loki was, it was far too easy to push the right buttons.

A snide comment on someone's girlfriend here, a verbal barb against one's masculinity there and he had the confrontation he wanted. He was very cautious about the choice of his opponents, he might have been out of his mind, but he wasn't stupid. He knew his advantages. He was young and agile and growing up with an oaf like Thor he had very early on learned to stand on his own two feet in a fight. He was very careful not to pick fights he knew he wasn't able to get out of unharmed. Today he had been sloppy though. The guy had been a lot fitter than he had first appeared and Loki had overlooked his bulky pal, who apparently had been on the toilet when the fight had started. He had made a close escape, but not before he had taken a fist to his nose that had him see stars.

He knew it was stupid, but deep down he blamed Rose Tyler for this slip in his record. After all, he had never been careless before she had sauntered into his life and taken over his every waking thought.

As he slowed down to an easy jog, Loki reached up his hand to closer examine his nose. He sighed with relief when he found that it was bleeding and sore, but didn't appear to be broken. _That_ would have been difficult to explain, when a good deal of the excitement about his late night excursions was about him sneaking out of the house without anyone noticing he was gone. He was able to sell a lot of crap to his parents – even more now that they both were fighting their own bad conscious about lying to him for so long – but even he wouldn't have been able to explain to them how he had come by a broken nose while supposedly lying in his bed like a good son.

He started looking for a tissue in the pockets of his pants when he realized that the blood kept dripping on his shirt. He would have to discretely get rid of it once he got home. He was so distracted he didn't notice the figure turning around the corner before him until it was already too late and the both of them had bumped into each other, knocking the other person off their feet.

"Oh no! I'm so sorry!" Loki hurried to apologize, but was only rewarded by a billow of crude imprecations in a very distinctive British accent he was already far too familiar with. He took a startled step back, blinking unbelievingly at the figure scrambling back to her feet. For a split second he caught himself foolishly wondering if the way she had been haunting his thoughts all day long had miraculously summoned her there. "Rose!"


End file.
